


Creations - Portfolio

by seraphenanox



Series: Creations Poignant and Transcendent [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Fluff, M/M, Memory Loss
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-01
Updated: 2017-07-29
Packaged: 2018-07-28 13:25:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7642330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seraphenanox/pseuds/seraphenanox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bits and pieces of Tony and James before, during and after the main stories in Creations Poignant and Transcendent.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Of Music and Memories - James

**Author's Note:**

> So there are lot of drabbles and snippets that can't quite fit into the main arch. These will be things that think help to flesh out the relationship and the world. Can't guaranty they will all be Tony and James but I can say that they will be helping me with the main stories. 
> 
> AKA this is were I'm going to plant those annoying plot bunnies in this 'verse that won't leave me alone and don't quite fit in the main. 
> 
> I don't own the Marvel universe and I don't own the characters.  
> Warning these probably haven't been edited much less beta read. So let me know if there are glaring issues or if you have any questions.
> 
> Zvyozdochka. - Russian term of endearment - "Little Star"

 

He was supposed to be on surveillance. He was supposed to be finding out where the newest threat to all things Hydra was trying to establish itself. He was supposed to be following the newest lead back to their nest.  

He wasn’t supposed to stop until the objective was done. 

But the sound had caught his attention.  The tumble of notes floated out, bits and pieces that escaped the run down bar through any and every crack and crevice. 

There was no way the Asset would ever be able to explain why.  No reason the Winter Soldier should have stopped to listen. Nor should have the Winter Soldier curled up in the shadows and listened to the rolling sounds of a piano.

//

_It was a bit of an adventure in itself sometimes to find his Zvyozdochka.  What had once been lost connections  had over the years turned into more of a game, a slice of anticipation.  And not like it was something they did on purpose, but James understood it._

_Sometimes his partner wanted to be able to walk the streets without anyone noticing.  He wanted to spend a few hours without the cameras and the glitz._

_So it wouldn’t be the jet sets of Manhattan.  It wouldn’t be the known stomping grounds in Boston either.  When James had asked JARVIS, the AI had little to say on the subject.  Only that Sir was in New York.  When James had tried to ask about Tony’s mood the AI had only said tired._

_Tired could mean so much.  But James understood a lot from the inflection.  This wasn’t I just spent forty eight hours inventing things.  JARVIS would have said it was that.  And it was March, not December.  Every December they both battled their demons._

_March._

_Something about it teased at his brain.  Maybe it was a memory.  Tony had said they may start stirring more the longer he went without the chair.  Maybe it was something else._

_It really didn’t matter to James, all he really wanted to do was find Tony_

_They had places scattered here and there.  Tells set up and always changed when one of them passed through.  He used those checking in that market or this store.  He followed the trail as it circled through New York City._

_Not Manhattan, he knew it but had to check ._

_Not Queens.  James’s contact hadn’t seen the other man in months._

_He got the first hit heading into Brooklyn.  And finally in a post office box there was a slip of paper and a key._

_Shadows tugged his attention slipping through the streets.  Sounds lingered just outside his hearing and more than once he had to force himself to keep moving.  Sometimes he felt like someone was there at his side.  Not the left where Tony usually stood, but just a little to the front and on his right._

_No one ever was._

_The address was for a rundown building. Rust streaked the bars on the windows and grimes coated the brick._

_He wasn’t surprised to see a realtor’s sign half hidden in the filmed over window.  He was when he noted it said sold._

_Maybe it was those horrible movies Tony would watch, but James half expected the door to groan and squeal.  He wondered if the other man would jump out at him with a smile on his face._

_Then he heard it.  Tinny and thin but definitely music rose and fell full of things James knew his partner would never say._

_Walking into the back room he found his missing.  Dust covered almost every inch of the place. Tables and chairs were left to huddle in broken and abandoned tangles.  The bar had cracked in places. Gaping holes glared where shelves used to be.  Everything run down and left behind._

_Everything…but one piece._

_Old and battered the piano gleamed in the light.  Some white keys were yellowed and others brilliant and new, but none of them were missing. Not a grand, a tired little bar piano still sound true._

_Tony had his back to the door.  Studying the hunched posture, the tension in the muscles flowing from neck through the shoulders and into the arms it was surprising just how fluid and gentle the fingers were on the keys._

_“Decide to by your own bar?” He asked finally._

_The music shifted, to something more upbeat, a lie in lyrical form._

_“We needed a place.” The voice was toneless, almost mechanical._

_“We needed a bar?” that was a little bit much, considering the state of the place._

_“Used to be a Pharmacy back in the Twenties.  Got turned into a speakeasy during Prohibition.”_

_James felt dizzy for a moment.  Like the words should mean more than the definitions.  Like it was something here for him if he could just understand it._

_“We didn’t need a bar.” Because they didn’t.  What use…and James stopped._

_The music changed again slow and bittersweet this time._

_He scrambled to find something to talk about, something other than the fear building in him._

_“I didn’t know you played.”_

_That not him a shrug and a melody of something that echoed of crystal chandeliers and velvets._

_“My mother insisted I learn.  Something else to trout me out for display with.” Bitterness tinged the edges of the notes._

_“Then why do you still play?”_

_“It helps sometimes.” A pause and James didn’t know if Tony would say another word.  “With the things in my head. It’s just mathematics.”_

_James wanted to deny that, to disagree. There was precision here absolutely. But that was just the start.  He understood, he did.  A barrier insurmountable and entrenched, A wall between the mind and the body refusing to admit to something like emotions.  But the music that poured from those dexterous fingers told it all._

_Another step and James could see better.  The dark hair, not the Tony Stark trademark brown, but a raven black. James felt his heart clench.  If he stripped off that tank top would he see tattoos so real that only because he knew the method James could say they weren’t. If he turned to face him would James see brown eyes or blue to match the raven hair._

_Tony Stark couldn’t walk the streets and not be recognized.  Tony Stark couldn’t live a life outside the cameras.  Tony Stark couldn’t be a mercenary._

_Gabriel Dernier, however could._

_“Gabe bought a bar?” he asked._

_“I bought a bar.”_

_Once more the music shifted a lament that tore at James’s hear as much as it did his head. He knew this song.  He knew it._

_“Oh Danny boy, the pipes, the pipes are calling_

_From glen to glen and down the mountain side_

_The summer's gone and all the flowers falling_

_'T's you, 't's you, must go and I must bide.”_

_Tears rolled down James face.  He caught a flash of blond hair and blue eyes.  He felt the hand on his shoulder.  A thin light touch just as it was firm and strong._

_Without thinking, without considering James raised his voice._

_“But come ye back when summer's in meadow_

_Or when the valleys hushed and white with snow_

_'Tis I'll be there in sunshine or in the shadow_

_Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.”_

_In the end the voices and the keys stilled the last notes rising up disappearing beyond their reach and understanding._

_“Do you remember?” Tony asked turning around hunched around himself._

_“Should I?” James asked._

_Head hanging down Tony refused to look up at him so James curled up on the bench and wrapped his arms around his friend, his partner, his life._

_“I avoided my father most days.” Tony said burrowing his face into James’s shirt. “But March 3 rd was one day that I hid from him.” _

_“The war?” James ran his fingers through Tony’s hair.  Tony nodded._

_James had seen enough, known enough to know that most things with Howard boiled down to one man. “The day Steve Roger’s died.”_

_Another nod, but this time Tony pulled away to study James._

_James couldn’t, wouldn’t hide it.  The name rang a bell, pulled at some old pieces but any school kid could say the same._

_“I’m sorry.” Tony whispered._

_James wanted to punch something.  “Not your fault.  I know I have holes in my memory.  I know why they are there.  We did it.  Not them, not hydra.”_

_He traced Tony’s cheek bones with a gentle finger.  “We decided to protect the earliest memories, remember?”_

_This nod was firmer.  “Two more years Zvyozdochka.  Two more years and we can celebrate those memories, together.”_

_//_

The silence roused him.  The windows were dark and empty now.  The street void.  The Asset rose from his hiding spot fragments of his thoughts still echoing with the music. He sang soft and sweet, but so quiet only the sky could hear him.

“And when you come and all the flowers are dying  
If I am dead, as dead I will may be  
You'll come and find the place where I am lying  
And 'neel and say an 'Ave' for me”

 


	2. Shave and a Haircut

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's a trained assassin condition to withstand all types of torture, to refuse all kinds of blandishments. But there is one thing the Winter Soldier has never been able to resist.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Someone asked for details as to James's short hair. Too much caffeine and too little sleep later here were are. The scene wasn't included in the main story because I wasn't sure that it added to the actual plot. It was supposed to be funny and fluffy, but for some reason I just can't be nice to our boys. 
> 
> Takes place before Chapter 11 of What is Sown
> 
> Marvel owns them, I just play with them. Hope you all enjoy.

“Come on.” 

“No.” He could remain firm.

“Please.” Large guileless eyes blinked imploringly.

“No.” Shards in his head shifted and scrapped.

“Pretty please.”  It was a little eerie seeing that pouty look on a grown man’s face.

“No.” James slapped some steel to his spine when he ended up with a genius putting his head on his lap.  His fingers didn’t twitch to run through those silky curls.  His arms certainly didn’t ache to cuddle the other man close. 

“For me?” Long dark eyelashes fluttered at him like some Hollywood dame.

James sucked in a breath.  He wasn’t going to think about the times when Tony flinched away from a hand or shied out of someone trying to touch.  He just wanted to enjoy what he was able to have.

But he couldn’t do it.  “No.”

When James felt the barest hint of a hand against the cuff of his pant leg he seriously contemplated his life.

“Pretty please with sugar on top?”

“What does that even mean?” James groused trying desperately to find something, anything  for a distraction. 

Tony blinked nonplused for a bare second before shaking it off.  “Really?  That is where we are going with this?” One arm gestured out expansively.  The other tangled in the untucked tail of James’s button down.  “You have one of the most eligible men on the planet begging in your lap and you are asking about idioms?”

James pulled his mind away from that thought.  His head was too messed up, he was too messed up for that.  Add all the problems and issues just lurking in the shadows and …no.  No matter how much he wanted to touch, to match the memories in his head. 

But he knew to play the game.  Some instinct urged him not to withdraw, not to pull away.

“I don’t want a haircut.” He stated flatly.

[ "Moy dorogoy solntse.”] Tony whispered husky those eyes dark.

With a roll of his hips James slid the other man off the couch.

“My dearest sun?” He translated one eyebrow arched.

“Light of my life?” Tony ventured not looking the least bit uncomfortable or disconcerted by his relocation. “Joy of my existence?”

“Pain in my ass.” James muttered rubbing at his face.

Tony leered.

Raw edges shifted, slotting together, fitting together.

“Seriously.”  Tony shifted trying to look serious, or at least as much as a man could on his knees on the floor. “This isn’t about want, it’s about need.”  There was business man Tony with his deal making smile.

The glint of steel, the edge of blade, just the thoughts sent cold fire lighting up every nerve; the gears in his arm shifted and whirled.  “No.”  He breathed it out.

Now Tony nibbled on his bottom lip his eyes scanning and searching. His mouth was autopilot.  “I’m not saying that you can’t pull off the rugged soldier look, because you totally can.  But that’s what they know. That is what anyone can remember. Long hair, scruffy looking with a metal arm.”

“Who’s scruffy looking.” The words rolling off James’s tongue another fragment shifted.

“James.” Tony groaned.  “I am one hundred percent behind the fact that things are slotting back, but can we please just for a minute focus on this.  I am not saying that we won’t come back to this, I think a revisit to what you are remembering is a fantastic idea, but please, please, please can we finish this conversation first?”

The Soldier’s skill was in his sight.  He’d been conditioned to always look for the weakest spot, the best position.  Honed into an instinct he couldn’t stop analyzing it all.  In all he'd done all he been through he saw and analyzed and understood.

The slop of shoulders that read as amusement, the angle of the head that pouted and the curve of the spine set to be inciting.

Measured. Perfect.

But he could also see the shallow glaze in those brown eyes.  The tiniest tick in the corded muscles of Tony’s neck.

Iron rusted, iron corroded.  But steel, steel withstood.  And Zvyozdochka had steel in his spine. Unyielding and unbreakable to mask even faintest sign of discomfort, the tiniest hint that this wasn’t what Tony wanted.

James’s stomach rolled. 

“Zvyozdochka.” He breathed out the word with every shattered remembrance echoing through that one word. 

Tony froze.  The artifice vanished.  His head hung between his legs resting on his arms.

“I’m sorry.” Blank, empty raw words.

“Zvyozdochka.” James repeated daring to reach out, not with his flesh hand, he knew Tony would scramble. Gently, so very delicately he tilted that stubborn chin up. “I understand why, but I can’t.”

He cupped Tony’s cheek, caressing the sharp lines.  The genius swallowed hard, but nodded.

“It’s the gear.” The only question lurked in those now unshielded brown eyes.

James gritted his teeth and nodded.

“I can do it.” The offer was tentative, the eyes hopeful.

There were a thousands of questions that James wanted to ask.  Things he wanted to confirm.  But he couldn’t not when Tony looked up at him like that.  It echoed in resonated against hundreds of other times Tony must have gazed at him with hope and love burning so very brightly.

“Of course Zvyozdochka.”

**

Later he realized there should have been more questions.

Prudent things like.

_Have you done this before?_

Obvious questions such as.

_Are you sure you can do this?_

And one that James was never going to forget. 

_Why can’t I have a mirror?_

But he’d done it.  James had managed through every snip of the shears not to shutter.  Each time a lock of hair brushed against his skin there wasn’t even the faintest tremor. He hadn't pulled away when the cold metal touched his skin.

In a way it felt good.  He felt good, lighter. 

Maybe –

His eyes flicked open when Pepper strode into the room.  James blinked as bags fell to the floor, and her jaw dropped.

“Tony, Oh my god what have you done.”

James sighed.  Maybe one day he might just be able to resist the way Tony looked at him, but this, this wasn’t the day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Admit it you finished the title in your head. You know you did. :)


	3. Sounds of Music

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some things have to be reclaimed, some cleanses. But there a few, so very few, that have to be discovered.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yes, I am still writing on the main Fic(s). Yes, I am working on getting a "Real" Chapter done. Plotting out the roads and stuff. This one was fueled by too much time to think at work. 
> 
> Zvyozdochka. - Russian term of endearment - "Little Star". James calls Tony "Z" mostly in his head. 
> 
> Not really beta read though alternative titles suggested by the fun people reading over my shoulder: How James got his grove back or the Sargent’s New Groove.
> 
> I do not own the Marvel characters, I do not own any of the music mentioned in this story. If I did either of those I would have a hell of lot more time to write.

Music, he hasn’t thought about it much.  Hasn’t really noticed it outside of Tony’s playing.  That music he adores. 

Piano concertos slow and languid one when the genius is too tired for work and too exhausted for sleep. Driven and dark ones full of frustration he can’t speak of.  Turbulent clashes of sound, of anger too great to be trusted in the ‘shop. 

Music in general isn’t something he thinks about, isn’t something he’s really considered.  He’s too bound up in other things and other concerns.

Tony sometimes plays things in the ‘shop full of drums and guitars, hums unknown pieces while he works. Music is really more Z’s thing and James is just along for the ride.   

Then there the morning that he’s not alone in the kitchen.  Not Z, not at all.  Tony only comes into this room when the hunger pangs are too much for a smoothie in the ‘shop or his caffeine withdraw hits epic level.  Nope, this morning has Pepper Pott’s already sitting at the table and nursing a cup of coffee.  Black coffee, strong enough that he can smell it from where he’s lurking just outside the doorway.

She’s been helping, or rather working around Tony, forcing him to catch up on documents and agreements…all the things and more that Stark Industries had been up too in the missing three months and more of things that Tony had asked for.

And Tony had played music while he read every single piece, loudly.

“Damn that man and his hair bands.” She muttered into her coffee cup.

James blinks, mouthing the word.  Unfamiliar in any context but the obvious.   He could ask, but the harsh light in her eyes and the slight down turn of her lips stops him.

“I believe,” JARVIS said softly.  “The correct genre is Heavy Metal.”

“Jarvis?” Pepper shot up confusion warring with irritation before she catches sight James still lurking shifting from foot to foot outside the room.

“Good morning James.” She smiles and all the irritation, all the annoyance just gone.  It isn’t fake, it isn’t just politeness for politeness’s sake.

He will take her good will and run with it.  He opens his mouth to ask, but there is a genius squirming under his arm and squeezing through.  A grease stained and shambling one making a bee line for the coffee maker, scowling enough to the words on James’s lips.  It isn’t as important and what they are working on anyway.  

When the beast has slunk away, back into his cave, James hopes his bed but knows better. Pepper heads back to Stark Industries and people that are not Tony.

He doesn’t even have to ask.  JARVIS ready with an answer while James fixes his own meal uninterrupted.  

“A hair band, in this context…”

And James, not the Soldier, not the Asset, is enthralled.

He listens as the AI walks him through music genres, classifications and histories.  In the morning JARVIS chooses, selecting by top ratings and not the rather limited range of his creator.  By nightfall James is diving in avidly pursuing anything any everything with a dedication. 

It’s silly and fun and nothing do with anything he was before and everything to do with what he is now.

First thing in the morning is the hard for him to ignore ‘How Far We’ve Come’.  Not that he needs an alarm, not with his sleeping habits, but seven o’clock is a reasonable time to be up and more than reasonable time for someone to be rattling around the kitchen forging for food.  No matter what _other people_ have to say on it.

 Show tunes keep him company, selections by the AI, but sometimes James will ask for more by the same composer or ask something not to be played again.  Those are mellow and safe enough first thing in the morning and while he’s cooking. 

He sings along with ‘All I Ask of You’ while washing vegetables.  ‘I Could Have Danced All Night’ accompanies him as he chops them lost in the lyrics and the melody; happy that he can do this.  Regret happens and so does self-preservation a few bars into ‘If I Only Had a Brain’ when Tony stumbles in.

Looking at the genius, uncaffeinated and bleary eye stumbling anyone would think that he’d be oblivious to everything and anything until the first couple of cup of his heavenly nectar. James knew better than to take anything at face value, especially when it can to his Z. 

The music still plays, but James stops singing.  Trying to signal JARVIS is a clue, turning it off is suspicion.

No instead he turned back to the stove, counting down the seconds in his head.  He hears the first click of a coffee cup being selected, the heady smell as the other man pours.  James had the omelet to distract him when nothing else came but the sound of swallowing. 

Still nothing was said when he set the table, or when he herded Tony to his seat.  No lazy smile, no suspicious looks.  Just the black neutrality that frankly scares James more. That internal look that means no good for anyone or anything.

But James eats, huddled around his food, shoulders tight.  The hunch grows more and more pronounced with every bite.  He knows perfectly well that fleeing would be an admission.

When those shoulder shake, James pushes his own plate away in disgust.

“Oh go ahead, you’re gonna rupture something if you don’t.”

Z’s laughter drowns out the lingering ‘The Impossible Dream’. 

The solution is obvious, but the laughter isn’t mocking, the teasing...well what else are they going to do. 

Sometimes he does wear them.  When he needs to music loud enough to drowned out sounds he can never unhear.  When he needs the force of the percussion to make his body work, to exercise himself into exhaustion or at least stillness. 

When his memories are quiet he still loves the hard driving rhythms of Disturbed and Five Fingered Death Punch, beats and measures he can use to push himself longer and harder. Those he will play through speakers the sound bouncing and reverberating through the floor until Z is shouting about abusing his equipment.

Every time it makes James snort and Z cover that he meant it lewd, damn it.  But James knows better. He’s got a perfect memory of that faint blush.

They find their way together in this new thing, just like they have with everything else, poking and prodding at each other.  Tony advocates, loudly pontificating the superiority of his favorites, James retaliating with orchestral remakes guaranteed to make the engineer rant and rave.  James smirks and Tony glowers.  It’s Tony’s turn to be yelled at by James when he has JARVIS play ‘Memories’ in James’s shower. 

It is not all good.  There are songs he hates.  Sugary syrupy nonsense that JARVIS opines are a reaction to the bleak realities of war.  Stupid things that get stuck in head and drive him nuts for days.  Bad is when Z happens to figure it out, worse is when he’s the one that played the insipid thing in the first place. 

There are Irish ballads that make his heart ache, lingering with a taste of regret he can’t place. 

He loves modern swing and big band.  He listens to renditions by Squirrel Nuts Zippers and Post Modern Jukebox so it’s normal and natural that he goes back to the foundations.  Jazz and blues no big deal, Fats Domino have the bots whirling and twirling every time.

The first bars play of ‘Stormy Weather’ and he’s sweating, his head throbbing.  He pushes through it, past it, but he can’t say anything.  ‘That Old Black Magic’ starts and he’s running, the pain so intense he’s vomiting in the toilet. 

“Hydra hates Glenn Miller?” It’s not funny, there snot and tears over James’s face, but he’s laughing because the alternative is worse.

Tony doesn’t laugh doesn’t even crack a smile. He looks sad, so lost and James can’t help but to reach out to touch.

“I’m so sorry.” Tony buries into James side instead, neither caring about the cool tile beneath them.

It’s a question for another day, another time when he cares.  He’s grateful when Tony doesn’t bring it up again.  But starts the battle of the music over again.

He plays ‘All Along the Watchtower’ with Tony’s enthusiastic approval, sparks flying while Hendrix wails.  The genius isn’t so thrilled with Dropkick Murphys and Flogging Molly, he counters with The Clash. 

It’s totally Z’s fault, when he’s singing along to ‘Should I Stay or Should I Go’.  Glaring at James while belting out “If I go, there will be trouble / And if I stay it will be double”. 

James rolls his eyes texting JARVIS with his response.  Tony’s look of disbelief is priceless at James’s mocking intro of “Do you have the time to listen to me whine.”

Pepper almost ends them both with her entrance serenaded by Cake’s Short Skirt/Long Jacket.

She could have killed them both, it would have been so easy tears rolling done their faces and laughing like hyenas.

No jury in the world would have convicted her.

He has play lists upon play list and his favorites are 600 strong.  Every time he adds another it’s with a smirk.

_Mine._

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Also if you have suggestions for things you want to see in this verse feel free to let me know. Sometimes I need sanity breaks.
> 
> Also if you are curious, Yes Tony set up a false Identity. It will come into play later, but this as good piece to help establish it and how old it is. 
> 
> And no you are not wrong if you are thinking those names look familiar.


End file.
